McCain Campaign Plans To Keep Palin Away From The Press
McCain Campaign Plans To Keep Palin Away From The Press
Yesterday, McCain adviser Nicolle Wallace dismissed the fact that Gov. Sarah Palin has yet to take any questions from the press. “So what?” she scoffed. Today on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, campaign strategist Rick Davis suggested Palin might never sit down for an interview if, he said, it’s “in our best interest” to keep her away from the media:
SCARBOROUGH: Yesterday Nicolle Wallace suggested that she was sitting right there and told Jay Carney of Time magazine ‘Sarah Palin doesn’t have to talk to you, she doesn’t’ have to talk to the press.’ … Can we expect Sarah Palin on Meet the Press and other one on one interviews throughout the course of this campaign?
DAVIS: We’re going to do whatever we think is the best to win. We have 60 days left and if we think it’s a good idea to go out there and do those shows, we’ll do them.
SCARBOROUGH: Can you avoid it? Meet the Press?
DAVIS: We can afford anything we want to do. … We’re going to do what we think is in our best interest. If that means access to the press, we’ll give it to you.
Watch it:
The McCain campaign reportedly told the Atlantic’s Marc Ambinder not to expect any one-on-one interviews with Palin any time soon. Despite McCain’s pledge of transparency — even proposing a regular President’s question time with Congress modeled after the British version — he has been shutting off press access for months. Yesterday, a Time reporter explained that McCain bizarrely refused to answer his questions, “like he’d been body-snatched.”
Davis insisted that “there are no strings attached” to media access to McCain. Yet just this week, McCain abruptly canceled an interview with Larry King as punishment for a tough CNN interview with one of his spokesmen. What’s more, top McCain aide Mark Salter said that “only the good reporters” would get the best seats in the new campaign plane. “You have to earn it,” he said.
Davis told MSNBC that Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) “didn’t do a single interview until a week after his nomination,” but the assertion is false. Biden and Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) sat for an interview with 60 Minutes “just moments after” Obama left the stage at the Democratic convention.
Transcript: Read the rest of this entry »
Pro-choice Republican leader: McCain ‘really doesn’t care’ about women’s rights issues.
Pro-choice Republican leader: McCain ‘really doesn’t care’ about women’s rights issues.
On Tuesday at the RNC, ThinkProgress spoke to Jennifer Stockman, co-chair of Republicans For Choice, a conservative organization that supports abortion rights. When asked about how the choice of Gov. Sarah Palin would affect women’s rights, Stockman said it would mean they would have to “work harder.” She said she hopes McCain won’t touch women’s rights issues because he “doesn’t care” about them:
Well, it means we have to work harder. We have to make sure that the McCain-Palin administration…don’t make these issues, the social issues, the central portion of their policy agenda, as Bush has done. We have a lot of work to do. We don’t believe McCain would — he really doesn’t care much about the issue, even though he has almost perfect pro-life voting record.
On the prospects of McCain overturning Roe v. Wade, Stockman said, “The only thing that gives me comfort is that Democrats are going to win the Senate.” Watch it:
McCain’s lack of knowledge on women’s issues is well-documented. In July, a reporter asked if it is “unfair” that insurance companies cover Viagra but not birth control. “I certainly do not want to discuss that issue,” he said, pausing uncomfortably for several seconds. “It’s something that I had not thought much about.”
Woodward: Bush ‘too often failed to lead.’
Woodward: Bush ‘too often failed to lead.’
In his fourth book on President Bush, called “The War Within,” journalist Bob Woodward reveals a president who was hardly at the helm of his own Iraq war policy. The Washington Post offered a preview of the book:
According to Woodward, the president maintained an odd detachment from the reviews of war policy during this period, turning much of the process over to [National Security Adviser Stephen] Hadley. “Let’s cut to the chase,” Bush told Woodward, “Hadley drove a lot of this.” […]
In response to a question about how the White House settled on a troop surge of five brigades after the military leadership in Washington had reluctantly said it could provide two, Bush said: “Okay, I don’t know this. I’m not in these meetings, you’ll be happy to hear, because I got other things to do.”
Woodward also notes that “groundbreaking surveillance techniques” — and not the surge — were largely responsible for the drop of violence in Iraq, and he details the conflict between Bush and his top military advisers, particularly Gen. George Casey:
“Casey had long concluded that one big problem with the war was the president himself,” Woodward writes. “He later told a colleague in private that he had the impression that Bush reflected the ‘radical wing of the Republican Party that kept saying, “Kill the bastards! Kill the bastards! And you’ll succeed.”‘” […]
Calling Bush “the nation’s most divisive figure,” Woodward ends his book with a stinging indictment of the president, saying he was “rarely the voice of realism on the Iraq war.”
The Republican Priorities: What The GOP Focused On (And Ignored) During The Convention
The Republican Priorities: What The GOP Focused On (And Ignored) During The Convention
During the Republican National Convention this past week, Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) campaign worked hard to put distance between the senator and President Bush. Bush spoke briefly via satellite and Vice President Cheney didn’t address the crowd at all.
Despite these attempts, what was most evident during the convention was how similar the two men’s policies were. New ideas to address the country’s problems and actual policy discussions were given little attention. As FiveThirtyEight notes, instead, much attention was given to “the three P’s — Palin, Petroleum, and POW.”
ThinkProgress has put together an analysis based on the prepared remarks (a total of 38,055 words) of the convention speakers, looking at how many times Republicans said various words. A glimpse at conservatives’ priorities:
| Bush Administration Bush: 1 Cheney: 0 Gonzales: 0 Rumsfeld: 0 National Security Economy Other |
Health Care Health Care: 26 Medicare: 1 Medicaid: 1 Environment/Energy Science Civil Rights |
The New York Times has an analysis of the Democratic convention here.
ThinkFast: September 4, 2008
The U.S. unemployment rate rose to a five-year high of 6.1% in August, “heightening the risk that the economic slowdown will worsen.” “Payrolls fell by 84,000 in August, and revisions added another 58,000 to job losses for the prior two months,” while “the number of U.S. workers filing new claims for jobless benefits jumped by 15,000 last week.”
According to Army officials, “suicides among active-duty soldiers this year are on pace to exceed both last year’s all-time record and, for the first time since the Vietnam War, the rate among the general U.S. population.”
Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) will brief Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) on foreign policy in preparation for the vice presidential debate on Oct. 2, along with other conservative experts. Lieberman has already “helped introduce Palin to officials of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the leading pro-Israel lobby,” on Tuesday.
Pentagon leaders have “recommended to President Bush that the United States make no further troop reductions in Iraq this year.” The plan “calls for extending a pause in drawdowns until late January or early February” when up to 7,500 troops will be redeployed to Afghanistan.
On the trail: Today, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) and Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) will meet with voters in Cedarburg, WI, before holding a rally in Sterling Heights, MI. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) will be meeting with voters in Duryea, PA. Read the rest of this entry »
Palin backed ‘Road to Nowhere.’
Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) is now widely known to have twice lied about her strong support for the “Bridge to Nowhere.” Less well-known is her support for “another massive, widely criticized transportation project” dubbed the “Road to Nowhere.” The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein reports:
The “Road To Nowhere” is a $375 million “mega-project” designed to connect Juneau to the towns of Haines and Skagway via 50 miles of new road. […]
According to the Alaska Transportation Priorities Project, a group promoting “sensible transportation systems in the state,” the Road to Nowhere is an irresponsible waste. […]
The Governor came into office saying she supported the road, which was started under her predecessor Frank Murkowski. In an October 2006 questionnaire by Anchorage Daily News, she simply wrote “Yes” when asked “Do you support building a road from Juneau to Skagway?”
More on Palin’s record in The Sarah Palin Digest.
VIDEO: Top McCain Aide Tells Gay Republicans, ‘You Are An Important Part Of Our Party’
VIDEO: Top McCain Aide Tells Gay Republicans, ‘You Are An Important Part Of Our Party’
Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) has long opposed gay rights, stating that he is in favor of the “traditional definition of marriage.” Today, however, McCain’s chief adviser Steve Schmidt addressed a luncheon for the Log Cabin Republicans, a gay advocacy group. ThinkProgress attended the luncheon and captured exclusive video of the speech.
Schmidt opened by stating he has a personal connection to LGBT issues because his sister is a lesbian:
[I want to pay] my respect and the campaign’s respect to your organization. On a personal level, my sister and her partner are an important part of my life and our children’s life. I admire your group and your organization, and I encourage you to keep fighting for what you believe in because the day is going to come. You are an important part of our party.
Schmidt did not touch upon McCain’s opposition to gay rights and was cautious in expressing any support for the group’s agenda, simply saying that “over time” more equality for gays “will be reached”:
We as the Republicans are the party of freedom and as the party we strive to reach that goal and we’ll keep fighting as a party to reach it in full. And I think over time it will be reached. And you are an important part of this party.
Schmidt then changed the subject to politics and went after critics of Gov. Sarah Palin. Watch the full remarks:
Unfortunately, McCain campaign adamantly opposes the Log Cabin Republican’s agenda, which includes “equality for gay and lesbian people.” McCain said he couldn’t pick Michael Bloomberg as VP because Bloomberg is “pro-gay rights.” McCain opposes gay adoption of orphans, supports Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, and opposes gay marriage and civil unions.
ThinkProgress also spoke to Jimmy LaSalvia, Director of Programs and Policy for the group, which has endorsed McCain. LaSalvia said McCain last met with the group in 2000. A McCain aide, Mike Duhaime, spoke to the group this week. LaSalvia expressed support for Gov. Sarah Palin:
Well, I think that we have a lot in common with Gov. Palin. She is a reformer who hasn’t ever been afraid to take on the party’s leadership and stand up for what’s right. And that’s what we do every day. We have taken on our party’s leadership when we felt they were going in the wrong direction, and that’s what Gov. Palin has done in Alaska.
When running for governor, Palin opposed civil unions as well as gay marriage. “I believe that honoring the family structure is that important,” Palin said in 2006.
Palin’s Alaska National Guard aviation units among ‘the most poorly staffed in the nation.’
Palin’s Alaska National Guard aviation units among ‘the most poorly staffed in the nation.’
In a interview yesterday with ABC News, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) “has been in charge [of the Alaska National Guard] and she has had national security as one of her primary responsibilities.” But the Associated Press reports today that under Palin’s leadership, the Alaska National Guard has experienced a “crisis level” personnel shortage:
[S]ix months ago, Air Force Maj. Gen. Craig Campbell, the Alaska Guard’s top officer, warned in an internal memo that “missions are at risk.” The lack of qualified airmen, Campbell said, “has reached a crisis level.”
The situation has improved since the March 1 memo was written, Campbell said Wednesday in a telephone interview with The Associated Press — but not enough to eliminate his concern that shortages will result in the “burnout” of troops the Guard already has.
More on Palin’s record in The Sarah Palin Digest.
Palin flips on impact of oil drilling.
In an interview with Investor’s Business Daily last July, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) took issue with those who say that drilling for oil in the U.S. will not solve America’s energy problem. “I beg to disagree with any candidate who would say we can’t drill our way out of our problem,” Palin argued. Yet last night during her speech accepting the Republican nomination for Vice President, Palin mocked her “opponents” for reminding her that “drilling will not solve all of America’s energy problems” :
PALIN: Our opponents say, again and again, that drilling will not solve all of America’s energy problems - as if we all didn’t know that already. But the fact that drilling won’t solve every problem is no excuse to do nothing at all.
Watch it:
Community Organizers Respond To Palin’s Attack, Cite Civil Rights Movement
Community Organizers Respond To Palin’s Attack, Cite Civil Rights Movement
Last night during her speech to the Republican National Convention, Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) sought to play up her experience as mayor of a small town in Alaska by mocking community organizing:
PALIN: And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves. I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a “community organizer,” except that you have actual responsibilities.
Today, the nation’s leading organization’s responded to Palin’s attack:
– Center for Community Change: When Sarah Palin demeaned community organizing, she didn’t attack another candidate. She attacked an American tradition — one that has helped everyday Americans engage with the political process and make a difference in their lives and the lives of their neighbors.
– Assn. of Community Organizations for Reform Now: ACORN members, leaders and staff are extremely disappointed that Republican leaders would make such condescending remarks on the great work community organizers accomplish in cities throughout this country. The fact that they marginalize our success in empowering low- and moderate-income people to improve their communities further illustrates their lack of touch with ordinary people.
– USAction: These groups, and the millions of individuals they represent, are dismayed by the recent dismissal of their efforts in the form of political attacks. Community organizations have been at the heart of every major reform in modern history – from the Boston Tea Party to the civil rights movement for example, the quest for civil rights began when community organizers mobilized the disenfranchised.
– Community Organizers of America: The last thing we need is for Republican officials to mock us on television when we’re trying to rebuild the neighborhoods they have destroyed. Maybe if everyone had more houses than they can count, we wouldn’t need community organizers. But I work with people who are getting evicted from their only home. If John McCain and the Republicans understood that, maybe they wouldn’t be so quick to make fun of community organizers like me.
Faith In Public Life has more responses from leading community organizers.
Check out The Sarah Palin Digest.
Abramoff sentenced to four years in prison.
Today, U.S. District Judge Ellen Huvelle sentenced disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff to four years in prison “on conspiracy and other charges after federal prosecutors recommended leniency due to Abramoff’s cooperation in pursuing corruption cases against lawmakers and former administration officials. He faced a maximum of 11 years under a plea deal reached in 2006.”
Despite Saying Working Mothers Pursue ‘False Hopes And Fading Illusions,’ Schlafly Endorses Palin
Despite Saying Working Mothers Pursue ‘False Hopes And Fading Illusions,’ Schlafly Endorses Palin
The far right has largely embraced Sen. John McCain’s (R-AZ) choice of Gov. Sarah Palin (R-AK) as his vice presidential running mate. But as the St. Louis Beacon recently wrote, few Republicans have been “more gleeful” than Eagle Forum founder Phyllis Schlafly:
“The more Democrats talk about Sarah Palin’s lack of experience, the more it hurts Obama,” Schlafly says, “because it makes us realize he (Obama) doesn’t have any executive experience. Also, I object to him because he’s a guy who has never worked with his hands. He’s just an elitist who has done nothing but community organizing.”
Schlafly has also called Palin a “breath of fresh air.” “She’s right on every issue,” she added. In fact, two months ago, Schlafly had already asked Palin to speak at a Republican National Coalition for Life session at the convention this week. At the last minute, however, the McCain campaign pulled Palin from the event.
Schlafly’s embrace is hypocritical. She is so eager to endorse the Republican vice presidential choice that she’s abandoning her long-held conservative beliefs. In the past, Schlafly has railed against working women:
The flight from the home is a flight from yourself, from responsibility, from the nature of woman, in pursuit of false hopes and fading illusions.
Focus on the Family’s James Dobson has similarly jumped away from the ship of conservative values. Dobson has accepted the choice of Palin, a mother of five, to run for vice president, calling it “a personal matter.” In the past, however, he has blamed “the supposed crumbling of ‘moral values’ and [the] ‘anarchy that is now rumbling through the midsection of democracy’ on working mothers and ‘permissiveness.’” “A little push in any direction and she could go over the edge,” Dobson said about working mothers in 1998.
One of the few conservatives who has stuck to her ideology is Dr. Laura, who has expressed disappointment in the pick of Palin. “Marriages and the welfare of children suffer when a stressed-out mother doesn’t have time to be a woman, a wife, and a hands-on Mommy,” wrote Dr. Laura earlier this week.
Christine Todd Whitman: ‘Definite correlation’ between global warming and hurricanes.
Christine Todd Whitman: ‘Definite correlation’ between global warming and hurricanes.
Earlier this week, Hurricane Gustav slammed into the Gulf Coast, barely sparing the New Orleans area. As the Wonk Room has documented, the intensity and frequency of these storms is linked to the warming planet. In an interview with ThinkProgress in St. Paul, MN on Tuesday, former Bush EPA administrator and New Jersey Governor Christine Todd Whitman said that global boiling is undeniable:
There’s no question that the climate is changing and scientists will tell you that one of the outcomes of that is more frequent and more severe storms, droughts, and floods. They just can’t tell you when or where these things will actually occur. … Scientists will tell you that there is a definite correlation between these temperature changes that we’re seeing and the frequency and intensity and severity of storms.
Watch it:
Whitman added that she is “not as comfortable as [she] would like to be” with some of the decisions made by EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson.
Rep. Westmoreland: Obama is ‘uppity.’
The Hill reports that today, Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA) used the racially-loaded term “uppity” to describe Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL):
Westmoreland was discussing vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin’s speech with reporters outside the House chamber and was asked to compare her with Michelle Obama.
“Just from what little I’ve seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they’re a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they’re uppity,” Westmoreland said.
Asked to clarify that he used the word “uppity,” Westmoreland said, “Uppity, yeah.”
Romney mocks Gore for non-existent private jet.
Last night, at the Republican National Convention, former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney (R) called for “the immediate drilling for more oil off of our shores” and followed with a personal attack on Vice President Al Gore that received thunderous applause:
And I have one more recommendation for energy conservation — let’s keep Al Gore’s private jet on the ground!
Watch it:
ThinkProgress contacted Gore spokesperson Kalee Kreider, who replied, “Gore doesn’t own a jet.”
McCain Adviser Lies, Says Palin Told People ‘How They’re Gonna Save Their Homes’ Last Night
McCain Adviser Lies, Says Palin Told People ‘How They’re Gonna Save Their Homes’ Last Night
This morning on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Time Magazine Jay Carney pointed out that Gov. Sarah Palin has yet to answer any questions on foreign or domestic policy. McCain adviser Nicolle Wallace interjected, “Who cares?!” Wallace insisted that Palin “can answer the question” of how Americans can save their homes; in fact, Wallace erroneously said, Palin talked about it last night:
CARNEY: We don’t know yet and we won’t know until you guys allow her to take questions, you know, can she answer tough questions, you know, domestic policy, foreign policy–
WALLACE: But I mean like from who? From you? Who cares?!
CARNEY: Who cares? I think the American people care.
WALLACE: I think the American people want to see her — I mean who cares if she can talk to Time Magazine? She talked to the American people. The American people want to say, “How am I going to save my home?” She can answer that question. … She took the stage and talked to the American people about things they care about: How they’re gonna save their homes.
Watch it:
Of course, Palin never said anything about the housing crisis in her speech. Though she attacked Barack Obama and community organizers, lied about her opposition to the Bridge to Nowhere, and reversed positions on whether we can “drill our way out of” the energy crisis, Palin did not mention any aspect of domestic or foreign policy during her speech. She discussed McCain’s POW experience, compared herself to a pitbull, and declared that “victory in Iraq is finally in sight,” but never said anything remotely related to how Americans could save their homes.
Appearing on CNN this morning, Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE) praised her performance but said it lacked specific policy recommendations. “I didn’t hear the phrase ‘middle class.’ I didn’t hear a single word about health care. I didn’t hear a single word about helping people get to college,” Biden said.
Specter: Lieberman is ‘practically’ voting as a Republican already.
Specter: Lieberman is ‘practically’ voting as a Republican already.
In his RNC speech Tuesday, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) referred to himself as a progressive, stating, “What, after all, is a Democrat like me doing at a Republican convention like this?” In a small RNC press conference yesterday that ThinkProgress attended, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-PA) said that Lieberman is “practically” voting as a conservative now and should switch parties:
Well I would like to see him move a little closer to being a Republican. I’d like to see him vote with the Republicans when we go back in September. He’s practically there. That would have the consequence of giving us a Republican senator . We could confirm a lot of judges. We could do a lot of things.
Specter said he has talked to Lieberman about switching parties “over the past many months.” Lieberman responds with “a very winning smile” when discussing the matter, he added.
McCain knew Tina Fey before he knew Sarah Palin.
McCain knew Tina Fey before he knew Sarah Palin.
Last week, Atrios highlighted a McCain-Palin image and remarked, “It just looks like something from a bad Hollywood sitcomish movie about a presidential campaign. Matt Yglesias added, “But what it really looks like — exactly like — is something from a movie where the joke is that Tina Fey is John McCain’s running mate. It’s the part she was born to play.” Ironically, in September 2004 — more than three years before McCain first met Palin — Life featured Fey and McCain on its cover:
Steelworkers President To Palin: ‘Stop Using Your Husband’s Membership In The USW As A Prop’
Steelworkers President To Palin: ‘Stop Using Your Husband’s Membership In The USW As A Prop’
When Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) introduced Gov. Sarah Palin as his running mate, he trumpeted her husband’s union membership: “The person I’m about to introduce to you was a union member and is married to a union member, and understands the problems, the hopes and the values of working people,” he said. That day, and again last night, Palin also emphasized that her husband is “a proud member of the United Steelworkers Union.”
Conservatives are hoping the reference will play well in Michigan and Ohio. But the United Steelworkers union (USW) isn’t so pleased. USW President Leo Gerard noted that just because Todd Palin is a union member doesn’t mean that Palin is automatically qualified to represent labor interests:
It is important to realize that while the governor’s husband is a member of a union, this does not automatically qualify her for an on-the-job training program to become a heartbeat away from the presidency. And while her husband is one of 850,000 dues-paying members of the steelworkers union, it does nothing to absolve Sen. McCain of his long history of anti-union sentiment and anti-worker actions.
In fact, McCain’s hostility to unions and union priorities runs deep:
– McCain voted to block the Employee Free Choice Act, making it easier for workers to unionize. [6/26/07]
– McCain condemned unions as “serious excesses” and said government workers are “crippled” by union contracts. [10/9/07; 5/21/07]
– McCain voted to filibuster a minimum wage hike last year. [1/24/07]
– McCain voted against a bill protecting discrimination against workers who go on strike, effectively allowing companies to hire permanent replacements for striking workers. [S. 55, 7/13/94]
– McCain voted against an amendment providing more effective remedies to victims of gender discrimination in the payment of wages. [7/17/07]
Last night, Gerard demanded that Palin “stop using USW as a prop.” Noting McCain’s opposition to the top priorities on USW’s agenda, Gerard asked Palin:
Are you with McCain – and against workers – on these issues? If so, you need to stop using your husband’s membership in the USW as a prop, because then his union card cannot possibly cover up your or John McCain’s worker-savaging positions.
Does Hagee think Todd Palin is ‘worse than an infidel’?
Does Hagee think Todd Palin is ‘worse than an infidel’?
On MSNBC this morning, McCain campaign spokesperson Tucker Bounds touted the fact that Todd Palin is a “stay-at-home-dad.” Interestingly, radical cleric and erstwhile McCain endorser Rev. John Hagee insists that, in the Lord’s eyes, a stay-at-home-dad is “a bum” who is “worse than an infidel.” “Hell is your future home,” Hagee says. Watch it:
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